Some kids are just not that accepting

while. His friend, our neighbor, asked what I was doing living at his house. “She’s my family; she and my mom are getting married,” he answered.

“Eww, gross, that’s sick. That’s so gay,” the 6-year-old neighbor responded.

My first reaction was rather neutral. I wasn’t surprised. This kid, Molly and I had observed these two months in our new apartment, was not always kind to other kids or his parents. The day before our son related his story I heard his friend scream across the complex, “Come here, woman!” I have no idea who he was addressing.

But I, too, sat with my feelings and woke up the next day with sadness curling inside. Suddenly I realized, like our son, it was my first round of teasing. It was as directly mean about me being gay as anyone had ever been in the 14 years I’ve been out. Then I remembered the words came from a first-grader, and fear replaced the sadness.

Connecting two women sharing a life and a family to the notions of “gross” and “sick” came from somewhere, or someone. TV? Movies? Possibly, though positive images of gay people are more and more common on broadcast television and in the multiplex theater. More likely, the adults in this kid’s life are teaching him to shun people who are in any way different from him. They are teaching him to judge without really knowing us.

The conventional wisdom about kids goes something like, kids are great because they are so accepting, so unencumbered by prejudices. Not this neighbor. On the other hand, we acknowledge that grade-schoolers thrive on sameness and will ignore or tease the kid who wears thick glasses, who enjoys school too much, who talks funny. Is our neighbor just being a kid?

Let’s say he was just being a kid, speaking without thinking, then no big deal, don’t take it personally. But there we have the problem and the reason that what our neighbor said is inexcusable – someone’s feelings were hurt. Calling a kid with glasses “four eyes” is certainly off limits and taught by parents, teachers, coaches and adults far and wide as unacceptable language, primarily because it hurts feelings. If someone asked our son why his skin is darker than his mom’s and he explained that his dad is Mexican, the chances that he would hear “eww, gross, that’s sick” are miniscule. It’s simply unacceptable language when talking about someone’s family.

My greatest hope is that this will be the last time our son is hurt by hateful words about his moms. In the meantime, he perhaps has the best solution. Molly suggested to him that the neighbor boy seems to be unkind in several ways and that maybe he should avoid playing with him whenever possible. “You mean I should play with Jake more!?” he asked excitedly. No need to dwell, he seemed to be saying, hang out instead with the friend who is just that, a friend.